DC Heavy Metal

This blog specializes in heavy metal music and how it relates to Washington DC and the surrounding area. Featuring info on upcoming metal concerts in Washington DC, Baltimore and Virginia, as well as info on local bands, area concert venues, reviews of live gigs, and lots of give aways.

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This Friday, March 16th of 2018, the Oliver Brewing Company in Baltimore is hosting their first “real” metal show when Black Lung, Sierra and Caustic Casanova perform there. Oliver has had some bands play there before but they’ve usually been matinee shows tied in to beer releases. This will be their first night time metal show. The show was put together with help from the guys that run the Maryland Doom Fest so as you’d expect the bands are along the lines of doom and stoner. Oliver is a good place for this because the head brewer at Oliver is quite the metal head. Oliver makes a line of special release IPAs that are tie ins with various stoner and doom bands that he loves. They also make an officially licensed beer for The Sword and will be releasing a beer for Integrity at the Decibel Metal & Beer Fest later this month in Philadelphia. There have been some awesome shows coming to Atlas Brew Works in Washington DC lately and I’m hoping that Oliver can become something similar in Baltimore. Time will tell but hopefully a lot of people come out and support this first gig to show that this kind of thing can work in Baltimore too! You can get more info in the show’s Facebook event page here. Now a little about the bands…

Black Lung is a local Baltimore based band and they play a psychedelic style of rock that is drenched in distortion.

Sierra is a band from Kitchener in Ontario, Canada (a little west of Toronto). They play some moody stoner rock/metal and this is a rare chance to catch them down in our area.

Caustic Casanova is from Washington DC and plays some really catchy stoner jams and they’re the perfect opener for this show.

Shameless plug here guys but I wanted to make sure you all knew about the black metal band, Uhtcearu, who are coming to Atlas Brew Works this Tuesday, August 15th! The show is presented by DC Heavy Metal and the entire tour is being sponsored by Atlas with local support coming from the bands Dagger Moon and Helgamite. More details on the Facebook event page here. It’s all ages and $10 gets you in to see three awesome metal bands. Sick tunes and great beers add up to an awesome time so be sure to come out! Now here’s some more info on the bands…

Uhtcearu (pronounced oot-key-are-oo) is a black metal band from Wisconsin and they’ve just released their second album, For Darkness to Subside, on July 28th. Give a listen to my favorite track off the new album below, titled “May Spirits Guide Us Through,” and/or pick up the album for $5 on Bandcamp here.

Dagger Moon is a DC based band that features a couple members of Ilsa. Don’t get them confused though, the band doesn’t sound like the crusty death/doom Ilsa is known for. Instead they’ve replaced the death metal aspects with some John Carpenter-esque synth work to create a unique take on atmospheric doom metal unlike any other metal band I’ve ever heard. Check out their track “Wolfpack” below from their 2016 album Citadel, and you can name your price (including free) to download the album from Bandcamp here.

Helgamite is a doom/sludge band from Luray, Virginia, and they play a psychedelic style of doom/sludge that really goes a lot of places other bands don’t dare to. They’re masters of tense build up though they can also crank out some sick riffs too. Check out their song “Snowdrifter” below, it’s a long one but by the end you’ll feel like you’ve been on an epic voyage through the land of trippy metal. You can also get their latest album, Hypnagogia for $8 on Bandcamp here.

Today, Friday the 4th of August, Bandcamp is donating the entirety of their 15% share of all sales on their website to the Transgender Law Center. The benefit runs until midnight Pacific time, which is 3am for us on Eastern time. You can get more info on Bandcamp’s benefit here. If the benefit is over when you read this but you’d still like to donate, or you’d just like to donate directly to TLC, you can do that here.

This means anything you buy on Bandcamp will help support TLC as well as the bands you buy from. Because of this I thought I’d throw together a list of some of the best local metal I’ve found on Bandcamp this year, as well as a few other metal bands outside of the area that are actively participating in today’s benefit here. If you’d like the full list of the 200+ bands and labels that are participating, metal and non-metal alike, you can see that here.

First up it should be noted that locals A Sound Of Thunder are actively participating in the benefit and for today only they are selling a “trans pink smoke” double vinyl variant (limited to 100 copies) of their covers album Who Do You Think We Are? for $25. The album will also be available on CD ($18) and digital formats ($8) for the first time. They have previously only been available to those who participated in the crowd funding campaign, however the CDs and digital downloads of the cover album will only be available publicly today. You can find all formats on Bandcamp here.

Chicago based Immortal Bird isn’t really a local band, though their vocalist, Rae Amitay, did go to high school in Fairfax, Virginia. Today they are also donating $1 of any Bandcamp sales to TLC, in addition to Bandcamp’s donation. I highly recommend their 2015 album Empress/Abscess which is just $7 digitally on their Bandcamp here.

Some other non-local metal bands that are participating include Ghoul who are donating all sales Friday and Saturday to TLC. You can download their latest album Dungeon Bastards for $7 here.

Massachusetts based thrashers Lich King put out a killer album this year in The Omniclasm and you can download it from Bandcamp for $10 here. Lich King is donating all of their proceeds from Bandcamp today to the benefit.

The Brazilian/Italian operatic metal band Ruins of Elysium has made a point of standing up for LGBT rights (just check the lyrics to their song “The Birth Of A Goddess” for starters) so it makes perfect sense that they’ll be donating their share of all Bandcamp sales today. Check out their latest album Seeds Of Chaos And Serenity which is available for download for $11.88 on Bandcamp here.

If none of that stuff floats your boat feel free to scour the list I’ve made below of some of my favorite local metal albums on Bandcamp of 2017. You can help support a local band and the Transgender Law Center when you buy any of these today!

Alluvion – Psyche/Stoner from Fredericksburg, VA. $5 gets you their 9 track album .​.​.​Of the One Consciousness that released in May here.

Ashes of Mankind – Death/thrash metal from Baltimore, MD. $6.66 gets you their 8 track album A Scene in Hell that was released in May here.

At The Graves – Doom/sludge from Annapolis, MD. Just $1 gets you a download of their 8 track album Wrecked that was released in late July. You can also get it on CD or cassette for $6 each. Digital and physical versions are all available here.

Blood Mist – Sludge/stoner metal from Baltimore, MD. $5 gets you a download of their 5 track self titled album that was released in February. You can also get it on CD for $7. Digital and physical versions are both available here.

Cab Ride Home – Thrash metal from Northern Virginia. $10 gets you a download or the CD version of their 11 track album Crash The Gate. Released in April, this is the band’s final album since their vocalist, Danica Roem, is now running for a delegate seat in Virginia. Digital and physical versions are both available here.

Earthling – Thrash metal from Harrisonburg, VA. $7 gets you a download of their 6 track album Spinning in the Void that was released in July here. This album shreds guys, highly recommended! Features Alan Fary who also plays in Valkyrie.

Full Of Hell – Death/noise from Annapolis, MD. $6.35 gets you a download of their 11 track album Trumpeting Ecstasy that was released in May. You can also get it on CD for $8.74. Digital and physical versions are both available here. This has been one of the most talked about albums from our area this year and it lives up to the hype!

Inhumation – Death metal from Frederick, MD. $6 gets you a download of their 6 track EP Ontogenesis that was released in April. You can also get it on CD for $8. Digital and physical versions are both available here.

Lord – Sludge/stoner from Fredericksburg, VA. $7 gets you a download of their 6 track album Blacklisted that was released in May. You can also get it on CD for $10. Digital and physical versions are both available here and they also have some packages that include tshirts with Mark Riddick art.

One Slack Mind – Stoner/groove metal from Washington, DC. $8 gets you a download of their 10 track album Both Sides Against the Middle that was released in July. You can also get it on CD for $10. Digital and physical versions are both available here.

Pain Tank – Grind/death metal from Northern Virginia. $8 gets you a download or the CD version of their 13 track album 97​,​901​,​726 Confirmed Kills. Released in March, the album’s name is meant to be the total number of fatalities in all wars that the USA has been involved in. Digital and physical versions are both available here.

Sickdeer – Black metal from Washington, DC. $7 gets you a download of their 7 track album The Wretched of the Earth that was released in March. You can also get it on CD for $10. Digital and physical versions are both available here and you can read the review of this album on DC Heavy Metal right here.

Sloth Herder – Grind/black metal from Frederick, MD. $5 gets you a download of their 14 track album No Pity, No Sunrise that was released in March. You can also get it on CD for $7 or cassette for $6. Digital and physical versions are all available here.

Virginia Creep – Stoner/Indie from Washington, DC. OK so this one actually came out in October of last year but it didn’t show up on my radar until this year. It features JR Hayes of Pig Destroyer as you’ve never heard him before, so that alone makes it worth listing here. $2.99 gets you a download of their 3 track self titled EP, just go here.

It’s the holiday season and what’s the best gift every year? New Apple products? World peace? Of course not! The best gift is brand spankin’ new heavy metal tunes! Washington DC’s own Borracho are three wise men who are stuffing your stocking with extra helpings of stoner riffage this year. Their brand new album, Atacama, just dropped today and you can download it digitally ($8) or get it on CD ($12) from Bandcamp right here, right now! If recordings of these tunes just aren’t enough for you be sure to catch Borracho in action at their CD release show on Thursday, December 15th at Slash Run. You can get all the details on that show here.

Can’t wait until the 15th for that sweet Borracho live experience? Well then you’ve got to check out the music video for their new song “Lost In Time,” one of my favorite tracks off of Atacama. This video was recorded at the Velvet Lounge on U Street and I’m going to have to warn you, if you’ve ever been a bit buzzed watching Borracho perform live then this video may trigger some flashbacks of the face melting kind! Well what are you waiting for, click play on the video below, crank it to 11 and drift off to the land of riff.

If you’ve ever wanted to day drink with Metal Chris of DCHeavyMetal.com (and honestly who the hell hasn’t wanted to?) then this Saturday is your chance! He will be at the Oliver Ales brewery in Baltimore this Saturday, October 15th, from noon to 5pm for their release of the Pagan Science double IPA. As usual Metal Chris will have some metal concert tickets to hand out, including pairs of tickets to see Helmet (on 11/7) and Napalm Death, The Black Dahlia Murder and Pig Destroyer (on 11/13) both at the Baltimore Soundstage! Best of all the event is free to attend and it costs nothing to enter to win the tickets!

So what exactly is this Pagan Science beer you ask? It is an 8.5% DIPA showcasing mosaic hops that is inspired by the sophomore album by the Austin based doom/psych band The Well. The album Pagan Science is released this Friday on Riding Easy Records, then the beer Pagan Science is released at Oliver Ales on Saturday, and to top it all off The Well will be playing the Metro Gallery on Sunday! The event is free to attend so if you’re in the Baltimore area on Saturday stop by Oliver Ales, try the Pagan Science beer and if you’re lucky you’ll end up with a free pair of tickets to an upcoming metal show too!

My buddy Brewer Will has gained employ at another brewery, now he’s working at Atlas Brew Works in Washington DC! We decided we’d take over Atlas on Friday, July 15th, for our next Metal Night event! Come hang out with other metal heads as we blast metal songs in the brewery all night, drink craft beer and, for one night at least, have a place to hang out with other metal heads outside of concerts.

Local band Borracho will be on hand to debut their new full length album and Will has even brewed a special batch of the Borracho beer, Oculus Smoked Brown Ale, just for the occasion. In addition I’ll be giving away tickets to a ton of upcoming metal shows around the area (see the full list at the end of this post). There’s no cover charge and no purchase necessary, all you have to do to enter to win tickets is show up! The event is open to all ages but of course you must be 21 or over to drink. There will be coffee, soda, and water for non-drinkers and DDs as well. The brewery has plenty of free street parking along West Virginia Avenue and it’s less than two miles from both the NoMa/Gallaudet and Rhode Island Avenue metro stations on the red line. If you’ve got any questions or just want to know more then check out the Facebook event page we have created here.

Feel free to send us some requests of songs you want to hear at Metal Night! It can be an old classic, a new favorite, or even your own band! As long as it is metal we’ll play it (ok maybe not super long songs like Sleep’s Dopesmoker but you get the idea). Send your requests to Will via email at Brewmetalwill@gmail.com

Here’s the list of tickets that I’ll be giving away (in pairs) at this event:

Summer Slaughter Tour (with Cannibal Corpse, Nile, Suffocation and more) at Rams Head Live on 7/27

Lots of people have been asking me if there’s going to be a DC Heavy Metal holiday party again this year and the answer is YES! It is going to be at the third metal night, dubbed Brutality At The Brewery, to be held at Fairwinds Brewery this Friday, December 11th! I’ll be decked out in my now infamous Cthulhu holiday sweater and giving away tickets to a ton of upcoming metal shows in our area (see the list at the end of this post). Brewer Will has brewed up something special for this event, a black wit ale named Iron Tongue that was brewed in collaboration with the guys in the local metal band Gloom! And as usual we’ll be playing songs all night that you have requested. To make your own song requests just send them to Will on Twitter at @BrewMetalWill or post them on the thread in the Facebook event page here. No bands will be playing this event! We all just hang out with other metal heads, drink some crazy good local craft beers, win prizes and listen to metal all night!

Things get started at 7pm and there’s no entry fee. Fairwinds Brewery is located just off of I-95 where it intersects with the Fairfax County Parkway. It’s on the edge of Lorton and Springfield and driving time is about the same as going to Jaxx/Empire was for most people. The address is 7000 Newington Rd, Lorton, VA 22079 (map). More info can be found on the Facebook event page we have set up right here! I can’t wait to see everyone on Friday! Now check out this epic list of tickets we’re giving away at the event!